The fiercely debated question of whether America should torture terrorism suspects is front and center in the national conversation Thursday after comments from President Donald Trump that America has to “fight fire with fire” and a report in The New York Times that Trump may review how the U.S. handles terrorism suspects.

Then, Trump shed some light on his feelings about torture again on Wednesday:

“I have spoken as recently as 24 hours ago with people at the highest level of intelligence. And I asked them the question, ‘Does it work? Does torture work?’ And the answer was, ‘Yes, absolutely.’”

He added:

“...when ISIS is doing things that nobody has ever heard of since medieval times, would I feel strongly about waterboarding? As far as I'm concerned we have to fight fire with fire.”

“I wanna do everything within the bounds of what you're allowed to do legally. But do I feel it works? Absolutely I feel it works.”

Pushed on whether he would be willing to support waterboarding and other interrogation techniques, Trump said he would rely on the decision of defense secretary James Mattis and CIA director Mike Pompeo.